Recently in Abortion Category

The Book of Judges has a curious story about a fight between the men of Gilead and the men of Ephraim. After the battle the fugitives of Ephraim attempted to cross the fords of the Jordan River but were stopped by warriors from Gilead and presented a challenge:

And when any of the fugitives of Ephraim said, "Let me go over," the men of Gilead said to him, "Are you an Ephraimite?" When he said, "No," they said to him, "Then say Shibboleth," and he said, "Sibboleth," for he could not pronounce it right.

Today, the term shibboleth is used to refer to a word or phrase that can be used to distinguish members of a group from outsiders. It can also be used to refer to customs, practices, or cultural touchstones that identify a person as being a member of a particular group.

For example, I have my own shibboleth that I used to identify members of the class, Civilized Human Beings. I call it the infanticide shibboleth. Opposing the blatant killing of human infants is admittedly a low bar of entry. But I figure you have to start somewhere.

Regrettably, the current Democratic nominee for President may not meet this minimal standard.

Of course most people--including Senator Obama--would say they oppose infanticide. This is why it would be necessary to present them with a test. For instance, I would ask them to read this description of the procedure known as "intact dilation and extraction", commonly referred to as "partial-birth abortion." I would also ask them if they thought that a baby that had survived a late-term abortion should be killed after it was outside the mother's womb.

After asking those questions I would gauge their reaction. If they recoiled in horror at the mere mentions of such actions I would warmly welcome them as fellow Civilized Human Beings. But how should I classify the moral prevaricators who would attempt to justify such atrocities? And what about a politician who voted in favor of protecting partial-birth abortion and voted against protecting born-alive infants?

Yesterday Phil Johnson, of the aptly named Pyromanics blog, threw gasoline on the flames of the debate about Christian involvement in politics with his provocatively titled post, "How Evangelicals Traded Their Spiritual Authority for a Mess of Political Pottage." Near the conclusion Phil writes:

How did the evangelical movement get so far off track? I wouldn't suggest that evangelicalism's recent obsession with political activism is the only factor, but I do think it's a major one. If the same energies and resources that were poured into failed political efforts had been channeled into evangelism instead, I'm convinced that would have been instrumental in producing more spiritual good and hindering more of society's evils than all our lobbying, demonstrating, and voting combined.

I'm a fan of Phil's work so it's with some reticence that I criticize his argument. But it's worth debating because it contains a commonly held erroneous view. Aside from the false dilemma and the assumption that energy and resources that produced a failure would have been successful had they only been applied elsewhere, Phil's contention fails for the simple reason that his premise is based on a myth.

Contrary to what many secularists claim--and many Christians believe--we evangelicals are not all that politically involved. Sure, like most Americans we talk a lot about politics, especially in an election season. But the claim that we are involved in actual political activities--lobbying, organizing, campaigning, etc.--would be difficult to support with actual evidence.

I say this not only as a self-professed (and self-critical) member of the "religious right" but as one who has direct observation post on the political battlefield. From my vantage point it is easy to see that the commitment--much less the influence--of Christians in politics is wildly overstated.

For example, Family Research Council (FRC)--the premier lobbying organization of the Christian right in Washington, D.C.--has been attempting to collect signatures on an online petition asking President Bush to approve new Title X regulations ensuring that no taxpayer money goes to subsidize the abortion facilities of groups like Planned Parenthood.

To date, almost one million emails have been sent to Christians asking them to do nothing more than add their name. This is about as minor a level of commitment or involvement as it gets yet only about 3% have done so. More Christians voted for the 5th place contestant on last week's American Idol than have petitioned to defund abortion mills.

This is the typical reaction at the grassroots level to almost every political initiative in the "religious right." Lot's of talk; little to no action.

FRC is considered one of the major players in the world of conservative evangelical politics. And yet the organization's ability to have any influence or impact in the political realm is limited by the lack of grassroots commitment. Though FRC and similar groups attempt to rally the troops, they are unable to lead the army of politically engaged evangelicals because such a group is all but nonexistent. 

Lila Rose, a pro-life student and reporter at UCLA, launched an undercover investigation aimed at exposing the racial insensitivity of Planned Parenthood. With the help of an actor, she contacted Planned Parenthood clinics in seven states, inquiring if they would be willing to accept a donation earmarked for the abortion of black babies. Not one employee objected or questioned the request, even when the actor insisted that the purpose was to "lower the number of black people" in America.

As Jared Bridges says, "Never a group to turn away a buck, Planned Parenthood will take money from wherever and whomever it can get it, be it the government, Hollywood movie stars, and corporations. That welcoming spirit apparently even extends to those who seek racial genocide."

[Note: Since today marks the the 35th anniversary of the Roe v. Wade decision, I've decided to repost this entry from 2004.]

Comparing the similarities between slavery and abortion is not a new approach. In fact, attempts to show a resemblance between the two has become so common that the argument has become trite and stale. While I have always recognized the connection, I found the conjointment less than compelling and all but useless in a real world discussion of the issue.

But then I realized what had been missing. Most pro-life arguments that highlight such comparisons tend to focus almost exclusively on the issue of personhood. Like slaves in pre-Civil War America, unborn children are defined as beings in which full humanity can be denied. This leads pro-life advocates to believe that if the definition of personhood were expanded and the unborn were recognized as human, then the rights of these children would be guaranteed protection under the law.

The fatal flaw in this argument lies not in the logic but in the application. In America, all rights are not equal. Even if they were provided legal protections, the rights of the fetus would remain subordinate to the rights of the mother. In a perceived conflict of interest, the unborn child will lose out in just the same way that the slaves lost out to their owners.

The conflict arises because throughout the history of our Republic natural rights have given way to the primacy of property rights. As historian James Huston notes in "Calculating the Value of the Union":

There are two broad political camps in the pro-life community: the incrementalists and the absolutists.
The absolutists are political idealists. They want a "Human Life Amendment" and a Federal ban on all abortion. Some of them don't even want Roe overturned since it would give the power to the States.

Incremenatlists, on the other hand, are political realists. They know that the issue of abortion won't disappear when Roe is overturned. Their position is that the best that can be hoped for is that the issue be returned to the people and to the individual states.

Once in the states, they will have 50 separate fights, some of which they will win (Louisiana, South Dakota) and many they will lose (New York, California). It's a fight that will take several decades, perhaps even a century, before the moral issue is completely resolved.

I am a political realist, which is why I am an incrementalist. Because I'm a political realist, I also believe than in the long run electing Rudy Giuliani will be even more detrimental to the pro-life cause than would a Hillary Clinton presidency.

Before I explain my reasoning, let me clear up one of the most common counter-claims that is used to justify Giuliani as the "lesser evil." Many well-intentioned pro-lifers believe that it doesn't matter if Giuliani is pro-abortion so long as he appoints judges to the Supreme Court that would overturn Roe. That point was raised yesterday in a post by my friend Justin Taylor:

To my fellow humans who are entering that most precarious stage of human development.

Let me begin by congratulating you on making it through the embryonic stage. Too many of our fellow humans don’t even make it as far as you have now. Many died of natural causes. Others were cut down prior to implantation by an abortifacient. Still others are trapped in the freezers of IVF clinics, in suspended animation awaiting their fate.

You have made it to the second stage of life. But you're not out of the woods, as they say, until you're out of the womb. In America there are roughly 250 abortions for every 1000 live births, which means that you have (all other things being equal) a 1 in 5 chance of still being aborted. Here are 4 reasons you might be aborted and what you can do to avoid this gruesome fate.

#1. Don't be the unlucky third in series of IVF induced triplets

Some couples are unable to have a child naturally because of infertility; others are unable because they are homosexual. Many are willing to pay high price (between $10,000 - $20,000) in order to bring a child into this world. Some are a bit more cost conscious and choose to pay an extra cost in human life rather than in dollars.

To save money on in vitro fertilization, couples can implant several embryos at one time in order to increase the changes of pregnancy and reduce the cost of multiple procedures. Although it lowers the cost, it increases the chances of multiple pregnancies which increase the risks to both mother and children. As the Washington Post notes, "Carrying three babies to term would more than double the woman's risk of developing the most severe diseases of pregnancy, such as preeclampsia. The average triplet is born two months premature, significantly raising the risk of disabilities such as cerebral palsy and of lifelong damage to the infant's lungs, eyes, brain and other organs."

Unlike embryos, money can't be created in a Petri dish. Which is why it is less costly (in economic if not in human terms) to just kill you rather than pay for another round of IVF. They euphemistically refer to this as "selective reduction" -- your parents have selected to reduce your chances for survival to zero.

If you find yourself bumping into other siblings in the womb, you might hear a conversations similar to this one:

If you were asked to name the technologies whose proliferation inadvertently threatens the human race, what would you include? IEDS? Assault rifles? Nuclear warheads?

Add this one to your list: the sonogram machine.

The widespread use of sonogram technology--coupled with liberal abortion laws--has made it possible for women to identify the sex of their child so that those without a Y chromosome can be killed before they're even born. Last year, in a speech before the U.N., demographer Nicholas Eberstadt revealed the details of this frightening trend:

Over the past five years the American public has received regular updates on what we have come to call “the global war on terror”. A no-less significant global war—a war, indeed, against nature, civilization, and in fact humanity itself has also been underway in recent years. This latter war, however, has attracted much less attention and comment, despite its immense consequence. This world-wide struggle might be called” The Global War Against Baby Girls”.

The effects of this war on girls can be seen in the changes in the sex ratios at birth. Eberstadt explains that there is a "slight but constant and almost unvarying excess of baby boys over baby girls born in any population." The number of baby boys born for every hundred baby girls, which is so constant that it can "qualify as a rule of nature", falls along an extremely narrow range along the order of 103, 104, or 105. On rare occasions it even hovers around 106

These sex ratios vary slightly based on ethnicity. For example, in the U.S. in 1984 the rates were: White: 105.4; Black: 103.1; American Indian: 101.4; Chinese: 104.6; and Japanese 102.6. Such variations, however, remain small and fairly stable over time.

But Eberstadt finds that in the last generation the sex ratio at birth in some parts of the world has become "completely unhinged." Consider this graph from provinces in China in 2000:

"I think this is too close to infanticide," said Daniel Patrick Moynihan. "[W]hat on earth is this procedure?"

The procedure that the pro-choice Democratic Senator from New York found so abhorrent was "intact dilation and extraction", commonly referred to as "partial-birth abortion." The late Senator Moynihan first voted to outlaw the barbaric practice in 1997. Ten years later, the ban on partial birth abortion has finally been affirmed by the Supreme Court and will soon be illegal.

Surprisingly, some abortion advocates are still claiming that this particular practice should not be forbidden. I find it unimaginable that anyone with a working moral compass could defend the blatant killing of human infant. Therefore, I assume that they are simply unaware of what partial-birth abortion entails. In order to help correct that deficiency in understanding, I've selected some passages from Family Research Council's pamphlet "Partial Birth Abortion on Trial" (PDF).

[Warning: The following contains a graphic description of the partial-birth abortion procedure.]

Objection: "[P]artial-birth abortion" is not a medical term and is not recognized in the field of medicine. The Act defines "partial-birth abortion" in a way that encompasses a variation of dilatation and evacuation (D&E), the most common method of second-trimester abortion, in which the fetus remains intact as it is removed from the woman's uterus." (American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists)

Response: True, "partial-birth abortion", like "heart attack" is not a medical term. Indeed, a more accurate term would be "partial-delivery abortion." But while it is true that PBA is a variation of D&E, there are "currently no medical schools that provide instruction on abortions that include the instruction in partial-birth abortions in their curriculum." The procedure was developed by abortionist Martin Haskell, who first described the procedure in 1992 at the National Abortion Federation Risk Management Seminar. What is the "medical term" for a procedure that medical schools don’t even teach? And why did the executive vice president of the American Medical Association say that "we all agree [PBA] is not good medicine"?

Objection: PAB is performed only rarely and then only when necessary to protect the health of the mother.

Response: Even the abortionists have stopped telling this lie. They were forced to stop claiming that the national figures were between 500 - 1000 after journalist Ruth Padawer showed that one clinic in Englewood, N.J., had performed the procedure 1,500 in 1994. The Alan Guttmacher Institute, the research arm of Planned Parenthood, finally admitted that the procedure is performed only about 2,200 times a year.

As one source quoted by Ramesh Ponnuru notes, "[I]f a new virus [were] killing 2,200 premature babies in neonatal units, it would be on the TV evening news every week."

Amanda Marcotte, the blogger who worked for John Edwards campaign before she fell victim to the "right wing noise machine", has an interesting take on abortion:

To see that abortion is moral, you just need to look at women as human beings with lives that have value. When a woman chooses abortion, she’s not indulging some guilty pleasure, like sneaking in a round of adultery at lunch, to bring up a genuinely immoral action that should not be criminal. She is probably thinking about her family’s well-being and yes, her own well-being. Taking your own well-being into consideration is called “selfish” by anti-choicers, but I think valuing yourself is a moral good, even if you are female. In fact, especially if you are female, since you live in a world where having self-esteem can be an act of moral courage that requires some defiance. If I got pregnant, I wouldn’t even have to suffer much mental strain to realize that abortion would be the best choice for myself, my family, and my relationship. Abortion, not just the right to abortion but the actual procedure, is a moral good that helps women and families and should be honored as such. Women who get abortions should be recognized as people who can accurately weigh their choices and make the most moral one.

In fairness, most abortion advocates are not as morally deranged as Marcotte. Some even consider abortion to be "morally questionable", a position Marcotte claims is a "huge insult":

Updated to add: Also, saying that abortion is morally questionable, even if you’re pro-choice, is a huge insult to the brave men and women who risk life and limb to perform them. Being an abortion doctor is a pretty thankless task, because a bunch of “Christian” men who have emasculation issues are gunning to kill you in hopes that brings their huevos back.

Again, let me be clear that I don't think Marcotte represents most pro-choicers. Marcotte is a special breed of crazy: a paranoid misandrist with a persecution complex and a broken moral compass. John Edwards must be thanking his lucky stars that this poor disturbed woman quit and skulked away before her extremist statements completely destroyed his already Quixotic campaign. (HT: Mirror of Justice)